220L Aquascape 2024 - Beginning

[Lia Joy]

Journal capturing the progression of my first aquascape so far...

220L, 900L x 500 W x 500 D, Chihiros light, CO2 injection (strideways, in-line), Eheim Pro 4+ filter (heater built in)

Aquarium: ND Aquatics
Steel frame on wheels

In a hard water area and have seiryu stone

Dark start method for 9 weeks - (long time partly due to waiting for light). Water turned clear in this time and some bottle brush algae grew on the wood.



Drained tank for planting. Kept filter running into a bucket to keep bacterial population alive



Filled with fresh water



Turned light and CO2 on
Light: 90% intensity, 8 hours, 30 min ramp up and down
CO2: 1 bubble a second, turned on 1 hour before light and off same time as light
Trialling 2ml of 2hr Aquarist complete fertiliser per day

Day 1: just after planting


Week 1: Checked parameters and bought 12 albino tetra and 4 amano shrimp
20% water change - will do weekly and adjust if needed



Week 2: made a lid (for practical reasons and temporary)



Overall plants are growing well and fish and shrimp also doing well. Some algae on glass, bottle brush algae on wood and now seeing some hair algae. Will monitor and lower light intensity if needed.

What do you think? Any advice also welcome

 

[Scaperinc]

Nicee but 90% is alot of light for new scape, is that wrgb2?

 

[hypnogogia]

Also, is weekly water change sufficient for a new high tech tank?

 

[Scaperinc]

Also, is weekly water change sufficient for a new high tech tank?

She did a dark start for 9 weeks so should be ok , I did 2 for a week though one 50 and another small one

 

[AquaJam]

Nicee but 90% is alot of light for new scape, is that wrgb2?

As your plants are young and you're getting algae I'd personally run 60% light, 10% blue if you have the option to dim it, that will help with starving algae, and up your water change to 2 drums 60ltr twice a week. 2 pumps of fertiliser daily in the morning. Once it's dying off 50% water change weekly and increase your lights 5% every month. You're using a strong light so 90% would be ideal for adult established plants. Good luck 👍

 

[Lia Joy]

As your plants are young and you're getting algae I'd personally run 60% light, 10% blue if you have the option to dim it, that will help with starving algae, and up your water change to 2 drums 60ltr twice a week. 2 pumps of fertiliser daily in the morning. Once it's dying off 50% water change weekly and increase your lights 5% every month. You're using a strong light so 90% would be ideal for adult established plants. Good luck 👍

Thank you for the advice - last week I changed the light intensity to 65% for all but will try turning the blue lower. I will also up my water changes 👍

 

[AquaJam]

Hi Lia, how are you looking now in your tank? Has everything settled down and stabilised now? Hoping my advice was good and I haven't caused you any issues 🤔 would love to see an update ☺️

 

[Lia Joy]

It has stabilised now - I did have a few weeks of brown hair algae - was doing water changes every 3 days and siphoning the algae out, kept the light intensity low and increased co2 injection a bit. This algae type has now completely gone and plants are doing well 🙂